Henrique Capriles

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Henrique Capriles Radonski, 2012

Henrique Capriles Radonski (born July 11, 1972 in Caracas ) is a Venezuelan politician and current governor of the state of Miranda . He is a member of the Primero Justicia party , which he co-founded, and ran unsuccessfully for the presidency of Venezuela in the 2012 election as a joint candidate of the opposition alliance Mesa de la Unidad Democrática ( MUD ). In the new election due after Hugo Chávez 'death in April 2013, he ran again, but lost just short of Nicolás Maduro .

biography

Henrique Capriles Radonski was born in Caracas, the second of three sons to a wealthy Roman Catholic entrepreneurial family. The ancestors of his father Henrique Capriles García were Sephardic Jews who had immigrated to Venezuela from Curaçao in the 19th century , the parents of his mother Mónica Cristina Radonski Bochenek were Polish-Russian Ashkenazi Jews who were able to save themselves from the Holocaust in Venezuela. Capriles attended the María Montessori de Santa Fe Norte primary school and the Institutos Educacionales Asociados (IEA) middle school in the Baruta district of Caracas. He then studied law at the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello . In 1994 he passed his bar exam and specialized in business law. He then worked for the Venezuelan tax authority Servicio Nacional Integrado de Administración Aduanera y Tributaria (SENIAT).

Capriles describes themselves as devout practicing Catholics. Because of his Jewish roots, he was repeatedly the victim of anti-Semitic expressions of opinion by followers of Chavez.

politics

Henrique Capriles joined the conservative democratic-Christian party COPEI at an early age . In 1998 he became a member of this party in the Venezuelan Congress . He was also elected as the youngest chairman of the House of Representatives. In 2000 he was a candidate for the conservative social-Christian party Primero Justicia , which he had co-founded, for the office of mayor of the Baruta district in the capital Caracas. He got almost 63% of the vote. In 2004 he was re-elected with 79% of the vote after spending four months in prison on charges of failure to intervene when the Cuban embassy was attacked in an attempted coup against Chavez in 2002. In 2006 he was acquitted of the allegations. In 2008 he was elected governor of the state of Miranda . He defeated the PSUV representative, the governor Diosdado Cabello , who has been in office since 2004 .

In pursuit of the political opposition in connection with the recall referendum prevented by the government in Venezuela in 2016 , Capriles was banned from leaving the country at the end of October 2016.

Prohibition to run for public office in 2017

According to a government announcement in April 2017, Capriles is not allowed to run for any political office for a period of 15 years. This was preceded by a decision by the supervisory authority for public officials. This was justified with financial irregularities in the state of Miranda as well as connections to the corruption trade around the Brazilian construction company Odebrecht . This means that he is not allowed to run as a candidate in the 2018 presidential election. He initially retained his governor's post. Opposition politicians see this as a continuation of the Chavist government's strategy of wanting to silence promising opposition politicians. Numerous other prominent members of the opposition are in custody or have been removed from their political offices. When attempting to travel to New York to report to the UN Human Rights Commission on his view of the current situation in Venezuela, the opposition leader Capriles' passport was declared invalid and he was refused entry.

2012 presidential election

On May 3, 2011, Henrique Capriles announced his candidacy for the 2012 presidential election . On February 12, 2012, he was elected in open primaries as a candidate for the Mesa de la Unidad Democrática (MUD) opposition alliance . It received around 1.9 million of the total of 3,040,449 votes (not including the votes of voters abroad). On June 11th, he enrolled in the national electoral council as a candidate for the MUD.

The main theme of his campaign was education policy. The state of Miranda, which he ruled, was the only region in Venezuela to take part in the PISA 2009 Plus study . He also stated that he would review the economic agreements with China and Russia and only renew those agreements that would benefit Venezuela. He also wanted to loosen the currency controls that have been in force since 2003 in order to make the country more competitive and to promote the export economy. He also pointed out that the government must make substantial investments to create jobs in agriculture.

The highly polarizing election resulted in anti-Semitic and homophobic attacks against him. With 44.25% of the vote, Capriles received the best result of an opposition candidate since Chavez took office.

2013 presidential election

Henrique Capriles ran again as a candidate for the opposition alliance MUD against Nicolás Maduro, who was designated as successor by Chávez , in the new elections that were necessary after Chávez's death in early March 2013 . Maduro won the election on April 14, 2013 with 50.66 percent of the vote against Capriles who received 49.06%. During the election campaign, the opposition and the media were severely intimidated and hindered.

While the Carter Center did not find any direct evidence of the falsification of the elections as such, it could not rule it out, as it had not been ensured that every eligible voter could exercise their right to vote freely and that only one vote per voter was possible and also unfair access options were diagnosed on campaign finance and government-opposition media, the Venezuelan Supreme Court, made up of judges who were subservient to the government, dismissed Capriles' lawsuit for a full recount as inadmissible. At the same time, Capriles was fined the equivalent of around 1300 euros. He has made “aggressive and disrespectful claims” and undermines trust in the country's institutions. The court requested that an investigation be opened against Capriles. A confidante of Capriles', his chief of staff Óscar López, was arrested on the day of the verdict and his home was searched.

Positions

Capriles describes himself as a socialist , but is rated as a conservative . He sees the former left government of Brazil as a model. Capriles also praised Chavez's social accomplishments, but criticized the concrete execution. A major theme during his 2013 election campaign was the fight against corruption . He also wants to end the current "checkbook diplomacy" and reduce Venezuela's dependence on foreign specialists, such as Cuban doctors.

Web links

Commons : Henrique Capriles Radonski  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

credentials

  1. ^ Roberto Ortiz de Zárate: Henrique Capriles Radonski. Fundación CIDOB, Barcelona, accessed March 12, 2013 .
  2. ADL Documents Anti-Semitism in Venezuelan Presidential Race  ( page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , jspace.com, March 21, 2012 (en)@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.jspace.com  
  3. Jasmina Kelemen (JTA): In Venezuela, Chavez Rival Demonized for His Jewish Roots. In: The Jewish Daily Forward. June 7, 2011, accessed March 12, 2013 .
  4. Portrait: Capriles - young, but politically experienced. In: Stern.de. October 6, 2012, accessed March 12, 2013 .
  5. ^ Power struggle in Venezuela; in: FAZ of October 22, 2016, p. 5
  6. NZZ , Monday, April 10, 2017, page 2
  7. Venezuela's opposition leader Capriles banned from public office. In: Deutsche Welle. April 7, 2017. Retrieved April 8, 2017 .
  8. Authorities withdraw the passport from opposition leader Capriles. In: Spiegel Online. May 18, 2017. Retrieved May 21, 2017 .
  9. Capriles declares his candidacy ( Memento of the original from May 4, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.globovision.com
  10. Participación de primarias llega 3.40.449 photos. (No longer available online.) February 13, 2012, formerly in the original ; Retrieved February 29, 2012 (Spanish).  ( Page no longer available , search in web archivesInfo: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / noticiasvenezuela.org  
  11. Education instead of violence
  12. Maurice Walker: PISA 2009 Plus Results Performance of 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics and science for 10 additional participants ( Memento of the original of December 22, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 13.8 MB), Victoria (Australia) 2011. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / mypisa.acer.edu.au
  13. Capriles on Economics
  14. Hans-Ulrich Dillmann : Hatred in the election campaign: Hugo Chávez accuses his opponent of being of Jewish origin , in: Jüdische Allgemeine from September 27, 2012.
    Karen Naundorf: Capriles Radonski, the Anti-Chávez , in: Cicero from October 5, 2012.
    Bruno Bimbi: Venezuela: medios oficiales atacan al candidato opositor por judío y homosexual of February 23, 2012.
  15. ^ Result of the 2012 presidential election, website of the Venezuelan electoral authority CNE. Retrieved October 23, 2012.
  16. ^ New elections in Venezuela: Capriles runs against Chávez 'party. In: Der Spiegel Online. March 7, 2013, accessed March 12, 2013 .
  17. Venezuela's dissent enrolls Capriles as presidential candidate. In: El Universal. March 11, 2013, accessed March 12, 2013 .
  18. spiegel.de April 15, 2013: Chávez's foster son Maduro wins presidential election
  19. zeit.de: Chávez 'Crown Prince wants rule.
  20. zet.de March 8, 2013: Chávez received the system and ruined the country
  21. Carter Center Issues Report on Venezuela Election , Carter Center, July 3, 2013
  22. Venezuela: Concentration of Power and Abuse of Power under Chávez , Human Rights Watch, July 17, 2012
  23. Leading opposition member arrested in Venezuela , Süddeutsche Zeitung, August 8, 2013
  24. ^ Venezuela: Presidential elections for Hugo. In: kurier.at. April 12, 2013. Retrieved December 25, 2017 .
  25. Werner Marti: Final spurt before the elections in Venezuela , NZZ from October 1, 2012